Murals & Monuments Walking Tour
Free
Tour begins at the San Francisco Public Library Main Branch
Join art historian, writer, and skateboarder Ted Barrow for a walking tour through San Francisco’s Civic Center, Mid-Market, and SoMa, exploring murals, monuments, and other forms of public art shaped by collective action and community collaboration. Beginning at the San Francisco Public Library’s Main Branch with Portrait of a Phenomenal Woman, the monument honoring Maya Angelou by artist Lava Thomas, the tour traces a path down historic Market Street over to Yerba Buena Center for the Arts and the exhibition Dread Scott: The Body Politic.
Along the way, Barrow will highlight works that celebrate the people and communities that shape San Francisco, while considering how public art can create spaces for connection, visibility, and collective expression. Together, the tour and exhibition explore the potential of art as a platform for protest and the struggle for social justice, and consider how artists use public space to give form to community, difference, interdependence, and the latent strength of a united body politic.
This program is presented in partnership with the San Francisco Public Library, the Shaping Legacy Project of the San Francisco Arts Commission, and the Market Street Arts initiative of the Mid-Market Business Association and Foundation.